Spider-Man Text Effect in Photoshop - Layer Styles Tutorial

In this Photoshop tutorial, we’re going to learn how to use Layer Styles to easily create the Spider-Man text effect. The the same text effect that you will see in the Spider-Man Homecoming movie poster.

Photoshop Layer Styles are non-destructive effects, such as shadows, glows, and bevels, that change the appearance of a layer’s contents. The effects are added by using an easy-to-use interface of mostly sliders, and checkboxes.

Layer Styles were introduced in Photoshop 6, which means that almost everything taught in this tutorial should work in older versions of Photoshop. The one exception will be the final part with Smart Objects and Camera RAW. But that is just a refinement to the final effect.

Layer Styles are often used to create text effects, but they have limitations. You cannot control the stacking order of the Layer Styles, and you are limited to a certain number of layer styles per layer.

This tutorial will focus on a technique that allows you to create intricate text effects by stacking multiple text layers with Layer Styles on top of each other. This method gives you full control. You can add as many Layer Styles as you want, in whatever order you want.

If you enjoy this Spider-Man text effect tutorial, then you might also like my tutorial on recreating the text effect from the show Stranger Things.

Spider-Man Text Effect Font

The font used in this tutorial is Good Times from Adobe Typekit. You can download it for free if you subscribe to the full version of the Creative Cloud. The “Photoshop” text in white uses Market, also from Adobe Typekit.

If you don’t have the Creative Cloud, then you can use any other font that you like. The font is not really that important. The point of this tutorial is for you to learn how to stack Layer Styles to create more complex text effects.